Burmese Delegation Visits Beijing for China-Myanmar Forestry and Climate Cooperation

BEIJING (May 13, 2015) – A delegation of Burmese officials led by Nyi Nyi Kyaw, Director General of the Department of Forestry at Myanmar’s Ministry of Environmental Conservation and Forestry (MOECAF) and Deputy Director Sein Htoon Linn, were invited to visit China by the Global Environmental Institute (GEI) from May 9 – 13, 2015.

On the basis of GEI and MOECAF’s cooperation framework, the purpose of the visit was to further promote China and Myanmar’s forestry cooperation and South-South Cooperation in tackling climate change and to encourage the adoption of Chinese clean energy products that can be applied locally in Myanmar.

Speaking with the delegation – GEI 2015

The visit included reviewing GEI’s forestry community conservation agreement project in Sichuan’s Fengtong Zhai National Nature Reserve, meeting with officials from the State Forestry Administration (SFA) and National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), as well as visiting Yingli Group’s headquarters and Fuda Group’s manufacturing base in Chuzhou.

In Beijing, GEI coordinated meetings between the Myanmar delegation and the SFA and NDRC, to discuss how bilateral forestry cooperation could drive sustainable forestry products, as well as investment, trade and South-South climate change aid.

Learning about Community Development Models

The delegation took field trips to see a community beekeeping cooperative and a household biogas project, both of which were supported by GEI’s forestry community conservation agreement project in Sichuan.

The delegation also held discussions with leaders of the cooperative, villagers, management bureau of the nature reserve, and representatives from the county government to learn about methods of running the project, operations of the co-op, livelihood of the community, utilization of biogas, management of the nature reserve, forest conservation and so forth.

Since Myanmar is also promoting the model of community forestry, Dr. Nyi Nyi Kyaw expressed his belief that Myanmar could learn from the Baoxing project’s beekeeping and biogas experiences.

Learning about Clean Energy Technology

Accompanied by GEI, the delegation visited the headquarters of Yingli Group in Baoding, Hebei Province, and visited the manufacturing workshop of solar energy products and photovoltaic installations.

Visiting the Yingli Group – GEI 2015

During the guided visit, delegates highly praised the company’s production techniques and its extent of automation, and also developed a deeper understanding of contemporary solar power generation techniques, its applications and its main products. The delegation showed great interest in the portable solar-powered lighting products, and thought these types of devices could effectively address the everyday energy issues faced by Myanmar’s large rural population.

Visiting the Fuda Group and discussing the clean cook stoves – GEI 2015

At Fuda Group’s manufacturing base in Chuzhou, Anhui Province, President of Fuda Group Mr. Ding Jianfeng welcomed GEI and the Myanmar delegation personally. He talked about the company’s products, performance and market, and took delegates to the manufacturing workshop to see the assembly line, device inspecting lab and product life testing facilities.

GEI had previously given 10 clean cook stoves from Fuda Group to villagers in Myanmar as part of a demonstration project. Results have shown that this kind of clean cookstove is not only capable of saving firewood, but with its eye-catching design, is also easy to carry, assemble, and use, and has proved very popular among Myanmar’s rural users. Myanmar’s delegation recognized the highly-effectively clean cookstoves and expressed hopes to explore possibilities of future cooperation to promote clean cookstoves for rural cooking activities in Myanmar at a large scale, in order to improve local villagers’ life quality, reduce deforestation and mitigate climate change.